As a whole I wouldn't list one author as the source of my desire to write but rather an over all fear of anything horror when I was a kid. I drifted towards horror because as I learned more about it, saw the mechanisms in place behind it, the reason why things frighten people, the less frightened I became personally. I felt if I could control the fear it wouldn't scare me anymore.
From a more technical standpoint I enjoy horror because it offers something no other form of writing can. Horror blends the supernatural with every day life so wonderfully. This, most of all, drew me to the genre, because I like imagining the bizarre intruding into the otherwise mundane. Science fiction and fantasy are often more concerned with creating an entirely new world for the reader to explore and literary works tend to be completely grounded in reality. It’s only horror that lets the supernatural seep into life very slowly until it takes it over completely.
I find horror to be a bit more freeing than other forms of fiction as well because at its most graphic there really aren’t any taboos, for better or for worse. Whether I want to delve into those horrible depths or not, I like that I have the option open to me just in case.